Montreal, April 17th, 2020- A week after reaching an agreement with Airbus, the Machinists’ Union was also able to negotiate an agreement for its members of the Stelia Aerospace bargaining Unit of St- Laurent.
This agreement allows Stelia Aerospace’s 246 unionized workers to maintain their employment relationship and a series of benefits until May 5th, even if they are not required to go to work.
Access to full coverage of their group insurance and contributions to their pension plan are maintained.
Stelia’s qualification to the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy Program (CEWS) guarantees a gross income of $847 per week for workers until May 4th.
Representatives of the Machinists’ Union also managed to negotiate a reduction in negative banking that allowed workers to receive 100% of their pay from March 24th to April 12th.
“This is great news for our Stelia St. Laurent members,” said Yvon Paiement, President of Local Lodge 712. As it was the case for workers in the Airbus unit, this agreement is more advantageous than Employment Insurance or the Canadian Emergency Wage Benefit. »
“The Machinist Union was able to obtain similar agreements with employers such as Air Canada, Airbus and Air Transat,” says David Chartrand, Quebec coordinator of the Machinists’ Union. In every company where we have members, we must work tirelessly to come up with strong agreements that will allow us to protect what they have acquired and ensure their health and safety. »
“In any negotiation, communication, respect and transparency between the two parties are necessary to reach a satisfactory agreement,” says District 11 Business Representative Eric Rancourt. As was the case with Airbus, the open-mindedness and frankness of Stelia’s representatives was a significant asset in this negotiation. We have made exactly the same requests to Bombardier, Stelia and Airbus, so far we have obtained positive results with two out of three employers. »
Stelia Aerospace St. Laurent workers changed employers on February 13th, 2020, when Bombardier divested its business in the A-220 Limited Partnership.
The Machinists’ Union (IAMAW) is the world’s largest aerospace union with more than 184,000 members in 1,000 collective agreements. Active in Quebec’s aerospace industry since 1940, the IAMAW now represents 65% of unionized workers in the sector. This includes members of the Machinists at Airbus, Bombardier, Rolls-Royce, Stelia, Héroux-Devtek, Safran Landing, L3-MAS, AJ-Walter, Air Canada, Air Transat.
